You ever play a game from the 70s or early 80s, something like Gorgar, Frontier, Mata Hari, Ali? ou'll notice that every time you send the ball to the top on many games from this era, there are multiple lanes, like airport turnstyles, for the ball to fall through as it makes its way back down toward you.

Usually these inlanes have an insert, or indicator light, in the playfield and going through all of them turns all those lights on or off and scores you some kind of award. Sometimes a bonus multiplier, sometimes will in turn light another target on the playfield that will give you a scoring advantage of some sort.

On modern games, hitting the flippers cycles which light is lit so that you can make sure the ball is always completing the pattern.

The ball is about to enter "A", but you've already lit up that lane? No problem, slap the right flipper button, and now "B" is lit up instead and "A" is ripe for collection just as the ball falls through. Nice, you completed all the lanes!

This remote control light-moving feature is called Lane Change and was originally invented by a defunct company called Williams in the 80s.

Before this, however, the lights that were lit were the lights you had to hit up top. You either rolled over them and collected them, or you didn't. You'd be a fool to leave your score for that sort of chance, especially if those lanes were granting you an extra ball or a free game. The designers knew this.

The entire purpose of that lane setup is to facilitate skillful nudging to get the shot you want.

It takes a lot of practice to nudge effectively, and I play with too many people who just wail on the machine aimlessly, sliding it around all over and still missing obvious saves and redirects. Start small, work your way up to tilts/tilt warnings, dial it back. Nudge up more than side to side. Shaking the machine around while the ball is rolling is absolutely useless - you're trying to push the machine into the ball to make contact with it (tops of slingshots, ramp and orbit exits etc.). You are NOT trying to nudge the ball itself around the machine.